


a sole and lonely determination

by ivelostmyspectacles



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, M/M, Martin is DETERMINED, Post-Season/Series 02, ain't nobody talking shit about his crush, at least, he won't BELIEVE the people talking shit about his crush
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-20
Updated: 2019-04-20
Packaged: 2020-01-20 18:05:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,032
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18530338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ivelostmyspectacles/pseuds/ivelostmyspectacles
Summary: “This isn’t Jon’s fault,” he repeats, and he’ll prove it, if it’s the last thing he does.Martin, immediately following MAG80 - The Librarian. Character study.





	a sole and lonely determination

“Oh, Jon… what have you done…?”

“I told you. I _told_ you!” Tim keeps repeating the same thing behind him, like it’s going to change anything. But he’s in shock. It’s fair.

Martin’s in shock himself. He can’t say anything. He can’t _think._ He needs to. He needs to…

“Fucking _hell,_ I’ll get Elias,” Tim says, and that, if nothing else, startles Martin out of his stupor.

“Wait, no!” He doesn’t know why he says it. He doesn’t know why he grabs at Tim’s arm like he’s going to stop him, but Tim just bats him away and looks _livid._

“What do you mean, ‘no?!’ What are you going to do, Martin, _hide the body?!”_

“No!”

“You can’t cover for him!” Tim’s yelling. There’s still blood dripping from the puddle oozing across Jon’s desk. Martin’s head swims. “Not this time! This is _his_ doing!”

“It’s not!”

Tim looks ready to murder someone himself. Martin’s more than a little terrified when he pushes him, but he takes the step back, closer to the body and away from Tim’s anger. It’s misguided, anyway. “Are you _stupid?!”_

No, he’s not. He’s _not._ Jon didn’t do this, and Tim’s just… _scared._

Christ, Martin is, too. They’ve seen so much. _He’s_ seen so much, _he_ spent almost two weeks alone with Jane Prentiss at his door, _he_ met her face to face, he’s studied murders and disappearances and read all the stories about death and decay and _all_ the supernatural things that went in between. Even that thing in the hallway and the… Sasha looking thing… he’s seen _a lot,_ they’ve seen a lot, but _this…_

This is _human,_ and it’s very, _very_ real, and it involves _Jon,_ and Martin thinks he’s never been more to scared to _death_ than he is now, in this moment.

But… he stands his ground. He _has_ to. Tim’s looking for someone to siphon his anger off onto, but Martin won’t _let him._

“You _know_ Jon didn’t do this!” He still feels dizzy, and he swears he can almost taste the metallic on his tongue. He forges on. “Jon gets flustered over _recordings,_ Tim, he’s not going to bash in someone’s head with a _pipe!”_ He jabs his finger towards the body without looking. _“He_ didn’t do that. He’s been _set up.”_

“I don’t know _what_ he’d do, because he’s not the same Jon that we used to work with! I don’t _know_ him! _You_ don’t know him, when are you going to open your eyes and _see_ that this _whole place_ is a LIE?!”

“Maybe so!” He’s yelling now. Maybe Tim’s onto something with the anger versus terror shtick. It’s so much more… cathartic to scream, when all he wants to do is _fold to his knees_ and _cry._ There’s an anxiety attack bubbling beneath his skin, if he wants to let it, so he raises his voice instead. “Maybe this place isn’t what we thought, and maybe no _one’s_ who we thought, but Jon. Wouldn’t. DO THIS! Something happened, you _know_ it did, something Jon couldn’t control–”

“He’s been spiralling out of control the past six months!”

Something falls from Jon’s desk, crashing to the floor with a bang. Martin hears himself scream, like he’s been disconnected from his own body, and scrambles away. Tim catches him half against his chest, hand at his back, and Martin realizes they’re both staring at the thing that had fallen from Jon’s desk: a goddamn innocuous paperweight, probably finally pushed over by the corpse crowding the desk.

His legs are weak. He’d feel ridiculous, except he can feel Tim shaking, too.

“… we need to tell Elias,” Tim repeats, after a long moment. He doesn’t say it the way he had before. He just sounds… numb.

… Martin wishes he could be. He’s not good with anger and now there’s nothing left to distract him from the panic. His vision blurs with tears that he can’t blink away. “Yeah,” he croaks. He _still_ doesn’t know why he’d been trying to stop Tim. There’s nothing they _can_ do. He just… he knows how this is going to go, and no matter what anybody says, he believes in Jon.

He doesn’t think there’s anything else he _can_ do, right now.

Still, he has to press his knuckles to his mouth to stop his lips quivering. “You can go, just… give me a minute.”

Tim nods once, and lets him go. He probably thinks he’s going to puke. It doesn’t feel too far from the truth. Martin flees to the staff bathrooms, and locks the door behind him. Then, he lets his knees buckle, and lets himself fall apart.

Just now. Just for now. He stays there until his knees ache from the cold, unforgiving tile, and until he can stop hyperventilating long enough to scrub away the tears. Long enough that he knows Tim and Elias will be waiting, and that the police will be on their way. No one comes looking for him, so that means he’s going back on his own. And he will. He _has_ to.

He forces himself to stand, and splash his face with cold water. And then he goes, determined, trekking the familiar, well-worn path back to Jon’s office.

Tim is pacing when he returns. He doesn’t look angry. Elias is there, an ashy shade of grey to his face. He looks like he’s about to be sick, himself. They both look up when Martin stops in the doorway.

He clenches his hands. He can’t pretend he doesn’t look a mess. He’d gotten a glance in the bathroom mirror, eyes puffy and red. But it doesn’t matter. None of it matters. Yes, he had let himself fall apart, but now it’s time to put the pieces of Jon’s innocence together. He _has_ to. He relaxes his fingers, and smooths his palms against his sides.

“This isn’t Jon’s fault,” he says. He doesn’t have proof. He has intuition, and all the feelings he’ll never dare say. But he will stand by the words he _has_ said. He might be the only one who _will._ “This isn’t Jon’s fault,” he repeats, and he’ll prove it, if it’s the last thing he does.

**Author's Note:**

>  _exhales sharply from s2 huh_  
>   


End file.
